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Preliminary report into Air India crash released

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Preliminary report into Air India crash released

#361

Post by sugarpimpdorsey »

XorNot wrote: post #239
cosmicgadget wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well in the murder-suicide scenario it makes sense for the culprit to turn them off as quickly as possible. The longer time to turn them on could plausibly be a struggle or simply needing to fly the plane while reaching for each switch individually.

Assuming the person trying to kill themselves and a plane load of people would respond in an expected way to inquiry is also just a mistake. It's not a rational decision, so there's no reason to expect rational decision making or explanation on the output.

Too many are willing to accept the Bart Simpson excuse of "I didn't do it" at face value.

Re: Preliminary report into Air India crash released

#362

Post by userbinator »

card_zero wrote: post #317
decimalenough wrote: post #11

> The aircraft achieved the maximum recorded airspeed of 180 Knots IAS at about 08:08:42 UTC and immediately thereafter, the Engine 1 and Engine 2 fuel cutoff switches transitioned from RUN to CUTOFF position one after another with a time gap of 01 sec. The Engine N1 and N2 began to decrease from their take-off values as the fuel supply to the engines was cut off. So the fuel supply was cut off intentionally. The swi…

Cutting the engines within seconds of leaving the ground doesn't fit suicide very well. I'd expect something more like flying into the side of a mountain or heading really far out into the Indian ocean until you vanish from radar and cause a big mystery. For instance, you might deliberately kill yourself by driving your car really fast into something solid, but you probably wouldn't try to do that while backing out o…

See Germanwings 9525 for an example of a conclusive suicide with no doubt from all the evidence.

Re: Preliminary report into Air India crash released

#363

Post by card_zero »

userbinator wrote: post #362
card_zero wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cutting the engines within seconds of leaving the ground doesn't fit suicide very well. I'd expect something more like flying into the side of a mountain or heading really far out into the Indian ocean until you vanish from radar and cause a big mystery. For instance, you might deliberately kill yourself by driving your car really fast into something solid, but you probably wouldn't try to do that while backing out o…

See Germanwings 9525 for an example of a conclusive suicide with no doubt from all the evidence.

See me obliquely referencing that with "flying into the side of a mountain".

Re: Preliminary report into Air India crash released

#365

Post by Scarblac »

winter_blue wrote: post #310
stephen_g wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a pointless exercise though - if one of the pilots wants to crash the plane, there’s almost nothing that can possibly be done. Only if someone can physically restrain them and remove them from the controls. There’s always going to be many ways they could crash the plane, such a feature wouldn’t help. The pilots are the only people you can’t avoid fully trusting on the plane.

So basically we need software that can 100% autonomously fly a plane. Software that is extremely reliable and trustworthy, basically. Software with multiple fallback options. Multiple AI agents verifying every action this software takes. Plus, ground-based teams monitoring the agents and the autonomous flight software.

Not AI, AI is less trustworthy than normal software almost by definition.

Formally verified traditional algorithms.

Re: Preliminary report into Air India crash released

#366

Post by ExoticPearTree »

emmelaich wrote: post #323
sgentle wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but you can open the door, pull the handbrake, or turn the wheel so hard you lose control of the vehicle. These are all similarly preventable, but maybe not worth the risk of being unable to open the door, brake or steer if the safety mechanism fails closed, or if your situation is outside the foresight of its designer. Also, you don't need multiple certifications and 1500 hours of experience to drive a car.

On a Tesla (and presumably other cars) opening the door engages Park. There's no handbrake to pull, and turning the wheel so hard to lose control is next to impossible. Maybe on an oily wet or loose surface.

There are very few failure scenarios that are life threatening in a car.

Re: Preliminary report into Air India crash released

#367

Post by ExoticPearTree »

imoverclocked wrote: post #355
arp242 wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You also can't reverse a plane while flying it... This is a rather odd comparison. You can slam the brakes, yank the steering week, and do all sorts of things to intentionally make the car crash.

You can put the reversers on for a tactical descent though :P

They look nice, but they can be turned on the C17 (and probably other military airplanes).

Commercial airplanes have safeguards against in-flight thrust reverser deployment. That is why they only work in tandem with the ground sensing systems - like the airplane must firmly believe both main landing gears to be physically on the ground for both reversers to be operational.

Re: Preliminary report into Air India crash released

#368

Post by decimalenough »

ExoticPearTree wrote: post #313
decimalenough wrote: post #11

> The aircraft achieved the maximum recorded airspeed of 180 Knots IAS at about 08:08:42 UTC and immediately thereafter, the Engine 1 and Engine 2 fuel cutoff switches transitioned from RUN to CUTOFF position one after another with a time gap of 01 sec. The Engine N1 and N2 began to decrease from their take-off values as the fuel supply to the engines was cut off. So the fuel supply was cut off intentionally. The swi…

> And both pilots deny doing it. > It's difficult to conclude anything other than murder-suicide. You’re trying to prove a negative here. I am not familiar with the 787 operations, but there are a few issues that need to be sorted out first: - altitude when pilots start the after takeoff checklist - if there are any other switches that are operated in tandem in the general vicinity of where the engine cutoff switches…

The switches have lockout mechanisms that prevent accidental triggering. I'm not a pilot, but these guys are, and they find it exceedingly unlikely that anyone would switch both off by accident:

https://www.youtube.com/live/SE0BetkXsLg?feature=shared

Re: Preliminary report into Air India crash released

#369

Post by ExoticPearTree »

bob1029 wrote: post #147
jeffbee wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Suggest a system that would prevent this, but only this, without causing other risks.

Disable the fuel system cutoff controls during the takeoff climb phase of flight. Once the aircraft loses contact with the runway, these controls shouldn't function without tripping certain thresholds (speed & altitude), or following a two-man procedure that is physically impossible to execute solo. In any other flight regime, the controls function as originally designed. The danger of a burning engine is irrelevant…

> The danger of a burning engine is irrelevant if you are heading into terrain.

Not quite. When you hit the ground you do not want any fuel leaks or hot surfaces as much as possible. That is why for example engines are shutdown when doing an emergency belly landing, to try abd prevent the airplane from bursting into flames.

Re: Preliminary report into Air India crash released

#370

Post by decimalenough »

chrisandchris wrote: post #307
sillysaurusx wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.youtube.com/live/SE0BetkXsLg?si=LPss_su3PVTAqGCO Both of these extremely-experienced pilots say that there was near zero chance that the fuel switches were unintentionally moved. They were switched off within one second of each other, which rules out most failure scenarios. If it was an issue with the switches, we also would have seen an air worthiness directive being issued. But they didn’t, because this…

> If it was an issue with the switches, we also would have seen an air worthiness directive being issued. I do not trust these air worthiness directives 100.0%. The 737 Max also required two catastrophic failures before it was grounded.

The issue with the 737 MAX became evident within months of the plane's launch. By contrast, the Dreamliner has accumulated over a decade of flying history across over 1000 aircraft with precisely zero fatal accidents.
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